Officials plan to charge stab suspect as adult

BANGOR – Investigators continued to search Wednesday for the knife used to stab a 16-year-old male last weekend, while prosecutors said they intend to charge the teen accused of the crime as an adult.

Aaron Heath, 17, stands charged with attempted murder and elevated aggravated assault after he allegedly stabbed a 16-year-old in the abdomen in the doorway of an Essex Street apartment building early Saturday morning.

Heath, who has told police in the past that he wants to follow his two brothers, both convicted killers, into prison, is being held at Mountain View Youth Development Center in Charleston. The teenager he is accused of stabbing lost a kidney and suffered a laceration to his liver, according to court documents. The condition of the boy, who is at a Bangor hospital, was not available Wednesday.

Authorities haven’t found the weapon but are bent on finding it and have been talking to witnesses and others since the stabbing, officials have said this week.

On Wednesday, several police officers were seen outside the house at 111 Garland St., within about a block of the scene of the stabbing, searching garbage bags and digging around the side of the home, according to neighbors who did not wish to be identified. The investigators were there for several hours, the neighbors said.

A man who was raking up and smoothing off the fresh earth along the side of the home would not comment when asked about police, except to say, “It doesn’t matter.”

Whether what police were doing on Garland Street was connected to the stabbing, a police official wouldn’t say. Detective Lt. Tim Reid, who heads the Bangor Police Department’s criminal investigation division, acknowledged that investigators are looking hard for the knife, but he would go no further.

“I can tell you that we are looking, but I’m not getting into the specifics,” Reid said.

Heath’s older brothers, Carl Wayne Heath and Smoky Heath Jr., are both serving 40-year sentences after each killed a person with a hammer, in separate incidents. Heath has told police that when he turned 18, he intended to get a hammer and follow his brothers to jail.

Prosecutors intend to use Heath’s record, history, emotional attitude, pattern of living and other factors to convince a judge to try the 17-year-old as an adult, according to a motion filed Tuesday.

Earlier this week, Penobscot County prosecutors were told that Heath was convicted of arson, a felony, for repeatedly setting fires that endangered nearby stores and buildings, Penobscot County District Attorney R. Christopher Almy said Wednesday. Almy said the information came from the Maine Department of Corrections.

But a Cumberland County prosecutor said Wednesday that three felony arson charges against Heath had been dismissed and that Heath had instead admitted to a single charge of failure to control a dangerous fire, a misdemeanor.

Almy said he didn’t know how the difference in Heath’s criminal history will affect the bindover proceedings but that it won’t stop them from seeking to try him as an adult.

“It’s not going to change our position,” Almy said.